By SPENCER BATES
ST. BONAVENTURE — After suffering one of its toughest defeats in recent memory against then-No. 24 Saint Louis, the St. Bonaventure men’s basketball team is looking to bounce back.
Atlantic 10 play has not been kind to the Bonnies and things only got worse against the Billikens as they were ushered into their locker room at halftime by a symphony of boos from a quelled crowd which had seen its team fall behind 58-26.
Things didn’t get better in terms of the scoreline as Saint Louis, the nation’s leader in margin of victory, maintained its advantage around 30-points for the remainder of the affair. But in the grand scheme of things, that meant things didn’t necessarily get worse for Bona. Head coach Mark Schmidt acknowledged that it would have been easy for his players to throw their hands up in defeat and lose confidence in one another. Fortunately, he didn’t see that as the case as they improved in the second half, only losing 39-36 over the final 20 minutes.
“If you don’t have character guys, down by 25, 30 at halftime, you can splinter and start pointing fingers,” Schmidt said. “Our guys really stayed together. We didn’t win the game, but we played much better in the second half. We didn’t get selfish. We played hard, Saint Louis just played better. You’re not going to be the team when they shoot 13-for-19 from 3 and got size inside. … We just have to play better. We have a small margin for error. So, especially against a team of that caliber, if we don’t play our A-game, we’re not gonna have a shot.”
It was after his team’s win over Loyola Chicago, its first through six A10 games at the time, that Schmidt first took the time to highlight the attitude of the team amidst the struggles. Before the season even began, the motto of his players was “no agendas” — they were in it for the long haul with each other. Even after the SLU loss, that has remained intact according to Schmidt. All they need to do now is simply play better.
“We have competitive kids, guys that hold themselves accountable,” Schmidt said. “And they know that we got to play better. Collectively, everybody has to play better. But I think (the mentality) is positive. We had a good practice yesterday, we had a good individual on Sunday. So that’s not the concern. We got to play better. We got to rebound the ball. We can’t allow teams to make 19 3s against us. There’s stuff that we have to do. But in terms of the attitude, that hasn’t been questioned.”
And there’s no time like the present as the time has come for Bona to make its yearly trip to its favorite Atlantic 10 opponent.
Duquesne has not had a necessarily great start to A10 play either, going 2-4 in its last six. Granted it has picked up two wins in its last three games but both came against the only teams lower than Bona in the A10 table (Fordham, Loyola Chicago).
Heading into the 92nd installment of this A10 rivalry, the Bonnies hold the all-time series record at 50-41, but their record in Pittsburgh sits at 17-25.
“They’re very aggressive,” Schmidt said of Duquesne. “Their guards are the strength of the team. They really try to push it in transition. They play a power game with the two big guys inside if the guards don’t have shots. They’re a very good defensive team in terms of their aggressiveness. They go over screens. They’re really aggressive trying to get downhill, aggressive defensively, trying to take you out of things. And they do a good job on the backboard. I think they had 17 offensive rebounds against Saint Louis, and that’s what really kept them in the game.”
The Dukes are led by the guard tandem of Tarence Guinyard and Jimmie Williams. Both in their first year with the team, they average 16.4 and 16.0 points per game, respectively. Schmidt noted that there will rarely be a time where they aren’t the highest priority for his team’s defense due to their versatility in scoring.
“Both (Guinyard) and Williams, they’re both really good,” Schmidt said. “They’re both attackers. They both shoot the ball well enough. Williams is stronger physically. Guinyard is quicker, but they can score at all three levels. They can shoot the ball from beyond the arc. They can play the pull up game and get the ball to the basket. They’re athletic. They’re good players. Half of their points are coming from their guards.”
But the key will be finding a balance defensively as Guinyard and Williams are just as capable of dishing out assists to their big man trio of David Dixon, Jakub Necas and John Hugley IV.
“(Hugley’s) a big body, you have to double him,” Schmidt said. “Dixon is the starting big guy, he’s got a great motor, rebounds the heck out of the basketball, runs the court really hard. And Necas is a problem as well. He’s a power forward at 6-10, 240 (lbs). We don’t have that size, which is a concern guarding him. They’re physical inside, they run an offense where they’re ducking in, playing a power game. … They got good talent and they play hard.”
St. Bonaventure will look to put its hefty loss to Saint Louis behind them with what would be a big road win over Duquesne on Jan. 28 at 7 p.m.
